jmartpr

I'm not disagreeing with Randy but the only thing he could do with a test car is adjust sway bars.....but when you have the car and can do other modifications more options are available which are better than the sway bars.
Again, it also depends on your track and driving style.....that's why they are adjustable.

jmartpr

I have the same recipe for mine with 0.5 less camber and stock position for say bars (might try on this car soft up front)....still have to order the DSC (backordered), all other parts are ready.
Next track day is April 25th so got to move on all of this.

DocMo

If you plan to do this step by step. Would you start with the sway bars? Front full soft and Rear full stiff?
Then decide on mods like DSC and TPC toe links.

BGB Motorsports

I think you are best served driving the car and then attacking it based on the end of the car that needs something. If it's too free / loose / tail happy you go up with the front bar. If it's the opposite you ....(you get the picture

mgordon18

This ^^^

A well-known GT4 guru advised me to keep the car as stock as possible and see what is needed to get the car the way you want it. For example, if you're wearing out the outside shoulder of the tires, you might want to add camber. If it continues, you add toe-links and/or camber plates to enable more negative camber... Same with sway bar, aero, etc. Only do what you need to do to get the car to behave in a way that works for your driving. This included sticking with OEM-sized 20" wheels, BTW.

Two things we did do, preemptively: DSC controller and a starting camber of approx -2.5F and -2.0R. We were somehow able to get those camber numbers (2.4F/1.9R, actually) on my car without adding camber plates or toe-links. Caster also ended up fine. I'll see how this plays at the end of April when I'm on track for the first time with this car.

I'd rather do it this way than make lots of modifications up front and having to go backwards to get it right - especially for me, since I'm coming from a 991 4S. A slightly understeering GT4 might feel like a ton of oversteer to me in comparison...

jmartpr

John beat me to it but I agree on what he says.....if you have little or no track time on the car drive it stock and gather all the data to see the best course of action to correct the issue.
On my case I'm basically replicating my 981 GT4 setup...may not be 100% optimal on the 718 but guess it would be a good starting point.

sobiloff

That's a lot of toe, especially for the street. Assuming 20" wheels, 4' is 0.5mm or 0.6mm, and 14' is 2mm. DSC's recommendations are for +0.3mm (2') at the front and +1.0mm (7') at the rear. You're going to get a lot more tire wear with the toe values you're currently running..

sobiloff

I ran my GTS (2.5) with just the DSC controller and a good alignment at Thunderhill and Laguna Seca last year. The only time the car got a little nervous was after turn one at Laguna, where you get on the brakes just after the rise. At street speeds it was marvelous in all conditions.

Full disclosure, though: I've got a set of TPC offset toe links on order and will install them because of @JCviggen 's unfortunate accident at Sochi. They'll throw me into SSP in autox, but I'll suck it up because I don't want that same kind of thing to happen to me during my track days.

phefner

@mgordon18 I came from a 991 C4S too, and your SPOT-ON with that "oversteer" feeling. I did 3 track days at the end of last season and it felt to me like turn-in is much faster with the GT4; as it should be in comparison against my prior 911 C4S.

I like your approach and doing same. Goes in for alignment on Monday, toe links on order, but will be the next piece when my current set of tires need changing. Hopefully I can get similar camber out of mine. Likely DSC later this year. I'll likely end up right where @dnimi123 lands.

@mgordon18 How much toe were you able to get?

dnimi123

Yes for sure start now. Watch jcviggen vdo at Sochi (Unexpected loss of control at 140MPH) post. You dont want to go to the track with the stock set up as it sucks (sucks as in the car is horrible and a travesty from the factory). Some may think this is an overstatement for my own pleasure... but its not. The GT4 is an amazing platform but Porsche really hobbles the car from the factory.

dnimi123

Sadly no the DSC controller is not enough. In fact I would say the opposite as in if you had one purchase to make it should be the rear toe links. The reason being is that the stock toe links are fixed not adjustable so the max camber at the rear is -1.4 and thats not enough to fix the tail wag of the car. So you need an adjustable toe link (doesnt have to be TPC, but theirs is widely used/popular). As Tom at DSC/TPC put it to and made sense is that "traction is traction, grip is grip on the track or the street." So if your goal is to increase the cars ability without ANY downsides (except a few bucks - $2500 max) then you MUST HAVE both the DSC controller AND the toe links (and set up initially as DSC recommends for the street and then go from there). I was skeptical at first but disliked the factory suspension set up for its horrible understeer and tail happy sloppiness... and thats just driving around town, so I had to do something to get the car right. Now its waaaaay better, more fun and more stable at all levels. Im not suggesting that DSC/TPC is the ONLY way but its a very good package, not too crazy expensive and gets you 80% there with no downsides. BBG, BBI, Emotion, Tarrett, RSS and a ton of other shops and vendors on this forum give good advice and sell these parts for a reason. That reason is the GT4 needs HELP to be what it should have been out of the box.

dnimi123

As mentioned the sway bars are a micro adjustment not a macro adjustment like alignment. The sway bars are for feel and how the weight of the car shifts under load side to side AFTER the initial vertical load is applied to the wheels/tires thru the dampers (I think thats right more or less). Like a very light side spring. So until you can get the vertical load to properly ground thru the car you are wasting your time. And you cant get the vertical load right until you get the camber set to a reasonable alignment and you cant get a reasonable alignment until you buy the adjustable toe links. Its sad, but true that Porsche screwed the pooch on this car for variety of reasons, but luckily it can be improved dramatically with just a little effort, research, time and money.

Westcoast

Doc, it seems like we want the same things from our Spyders, I had hoped it was going to handle 'excellent ' or like I thought a GT car should out of the box... it didn't, no better than my outgoing Boxster GTS, I was disappointed to say the least!

My car now handles like I expected it should, composed over bumps, no understeer, highway straight line feel is solid, stable and secure in high speed sweepers and turn in is exceptional. We added a few parts to allow us to go a little further then the stock parts accommodate, IMHO worth every penny. Oh, and yes the DSC controller too.

A link to a post above, and the earlier post with additional details: https://rennlist.com/forums/718-gts-...l#post17316852

dnimi123

THAT sounds improbable. Maybe you used shims or something else because the stock hardware is incapable of those camber settings - so without some mechanical alignment tool (like shims) its impossible. So that means what you did may have more negative or unintended consequences than if you had just gotten toe links , camber plates and whatever other bits and pieces 99.9% of other GT4 tinkerers get. PS. Im not meaning to attack you or doubt your numbers, but from what I know and have read you cant get to where you say you did without SOME mechanical intervention.

dnimi123

Hi BGB. You guys build race cars and know the 718 GT4 platform pretty well, non? If so how can you say IF! You know the car needs help. It sucks from the factory. Sure everyones needs are different as are driving styles... but the tool (GT4/Spyder) is the same, it doesnt change. I think the group is best served by experts like you you not saying to us 'hey go out and try the car and see what you think' but rather here is how we see it under these conditions so maybe try this.... again not attacking you, just respectfully asking for your deep knowledge of this particular car. Thanks